Princess of the Leaves

Chapter Three

"My name is Hatake Kakashi. I like some things, dislike others. Don't really feel like talking about it, really. Dreams? Haven't really thought about that. I have hobbies, quite a few actually, but none of them come to mind."

Zelda's new sensei looked around at her team with one eye covered and the other half open. Everything about him seemed to suggest apathy and sloth, but in a way too deliberate to be natural. His forehead protector, for example, was lopsided to hang down over his left eye, and there was a very specific range of tautness it could be tied so it didn't fall down over both eyes.

"Anyway," he said. "That's about it for me. Who wants to go next?"

Naruto's hand shot up. "Ooh! Ooh! Pick me, Kakashi-sensei!"

"Anyone?" Kakashi asked. "Anyone at all?"

"Right here, sensei! Literally right in front of you!"

"No one wants to go next?" He pretended to notice Naruto for the first time. "Oh, sorry about that. I couldn't hear you over how orange your jumpsuit was. Take it away, kid."

Naruto glanced down at his clothes. "You can hear color?" he asked amazed. "Right. I'm Uzumaki Naruto. I like ramen, especially cup ramen. My favorite flavors are beef ramen, pork ramen, miso ramen, chicken … chicken ramen is okay, but–"

"No one cares, moron," Sasuke muttered next to him.

Naruto glared back. "I dislike jerks. Like this guy. He's a jerk. I hobbies include training and … huh, that's about it. Man, I need some new hobbies. My dream …." His eyes flashed with sudden intensity. "My dream is to surpass the Hokage, and make everyone in the village acknowledge me!"

"Neat," Kakashi said. He pointed at Sasuke. "Mr. Sunshine, you're up next."

Sasuke glared at Kakashi before speaking. "My name is Uchiha Sasuke."

He named himself differently than Naruto had. For Naruto, Uzumaki was just part of his full name; it meant nothing beyond himself. But Sasuke knew many of his clan, and he was only one left.

"There are many things I dislike," he continued, "and few things I do. I don't have hobbies, but I do have an … ambition. I will restore the Uchiha clan, and I will kill a certain someone."

Zelda felt waves of hatred flowing from him as he spoke. For him, anger was not a reflex, but a choice, something that he cultivated over time until it grew and festered, becoming aged, rancid. Now he was barely more than a child, but if he continued to meditate on darkness, she knew what he would become.

"Adorable," Kakashi said. He turned to her. "Your turn, princess."

Zelda stopped with her mouth open. "Why did you call me that?"

He cocked his head. "Pink dress?"

Oh. Right. "My name is Sheikah Zelda." Maybe one of these days, she'd tell someone her real name. "I like reading and thinking and having time to myself. I dislike conflict and unnecessary violence. My hobbies are the same as my likes, and my dream is …." Should she lie about this too? She didn't need to, but she didn't need to tell everything either. "If I live another five years, that would be great."

In four years, Link would awaken in the Temple of Time, and Zelda would return to Hyrule to save it, or die trying.

Kakashi half sat, half leaned against a railing with his eyes closed. Naruto was the first to break the silence. "Hey, Kakashi-sensei! You awake?"

Kakashi shook himself and opened his uncovered eye. "What? You guys done? Good. We start our duties tomorrow."

"Duties?" Naruto said. "Awesome! What are we doing?"

"Survival training." He smiled beneath his mask. "Don't worry. Despite the name, no one has died in it for a long time."

"Oh." He sounded oddly disappointed. "Why is it called that, then?"

Kakashi let out a noise that sounded like a giggle. "Because if you fail, you get sent back to the academy."

Naruto's eyes bulged. "But I worked hard to become a genin!"

"And so did everyone else. Your graduating class has, what, thirty kids? There aren't enough professional ninjas here to waste babysitting everyone who can pass a standardized test. If you impress me, you can keep your shiny little leaf emblems, and if you don't …." He chuckled.

"But you can't do that!"

"I can, and from what I've seen of you so far, I'm probably going to enjoy it."

Naruto glared at him. "You're not still mad about that chalk eraser, are you?"

"I've already forgotten about it. Bring your weapons, equipment, and all your best tricks."

"Even shuriken?"

"I'd be disappointed if you didn't. Be at Training Ground Three tomorrow at six. Also, skip breakfast. If you don't, you'll throw up."

Zelda watched him leave, the wheels in her head turning. In the academy, the instructors had begun each year telling the students how excited they were to be their teachers and how much they looked forward to spending time together, even though the actions of many of them throughout the year proved them liars. Kakashi was just the opposite. He seemed to have no interest at all in being their sensei, and if that was the case, he could give them an impossible task tomorrow and be rid of them by the end of the day.

But he wasn't disinterested, he was deliberately trying to appear disinterested. If his apathy was sincere, he could simply fail them. Was it a ruse to make them try harder to make him want to train them? Or was he trying to trick them into thinking that tomorrow's task would be impossible?

And what of his advice to skip breakfast? That didn't fit anything he seemed to be.

WWW

The next morning, Zelda met her teammates at the training area at six. Kakashi arrived five hours later.

"Hey guys," he said with a wave.

"You're late!" Naruto said.

"Yeah, sorry about that … but not really." He pulled a clock out of his pack and set the timer for noon. "You have about one hour to get a bell from me. If you don't, you get tied to a post and miss lunch. Everyone who does get a bell will eat their lunch in front of you."

Naruto's jaw dropped. "But you told us to skip breakfast! You tricked us!"

"And you believed me. Let that be a lesson to you; never trust your enemy, who, until noon, is me. I probably should have mentioned that earlier."

Zelda nodded, having expected this, and pulled a candy bar out of her pack.

Kakashi looked at her. "You brought snacks?"

She smiled at him. "You told us to bring our equipment, and these are cheaper than food pills. Besides, I have enough for everyone?"

"Ooh! Can I have one?" Naruto asked. "I'm starving!"

"Sure."

"Yes!"

She turned to Sasuke. "Would you like one too?"

He shook his head, glowering. "No thanks. I can do this by myself."

At that moment, Zelda caught a flicker of emotion in Kakashi's eye. Pity? Odd.

"Before you set up your picnic," Kakashi said, "you should know that I only have two bells with me."

"What?" Naruto said. "But if there are two bells, and there are three of us, and one of you …."

"One of us will fail," Sasuke said. He sounded content with that.

"Or two," Kakashi said. "Or three. I have enough posts for everyone. Don't hold back. You can even try to kill me if you want. If you succeed, I'll recommend you to skip the chunin exam posthumously and go straight to jounin. The test starts now."

WWW

Zelda had two forms. Her Sheikah form was well suited for speed and stealth, and her Hylian form was better at using the Triforce and the blessings she had received from the Great Fairies. Neither was skilled at combat. It had never seemed important; she needed to be able to elude and outwit Ganondorf, not face him.

She didn't regret her focus. Even if she had been stronger, she wouldn't have been able to steal a bell. Kakashi proved early on that he could defeat all of them at once without trouble, so Zelda didn't waste her time fighting him at all. Instead, she thought.

She studied his abilities when he fought Naruto and watched as he bested him and left him dangling from a tree. After Kakashi left to play with Sasuke–because he was playing with them–she turned her attention to the lunches he brought as a reward for the victors. Or, more precisely, to the stone they rested on.

It was a memorial, with the names of fallen warriors engraved on its obsidian face. While the Sheikah tribe had sworn long ago to protect the Royal Family, there were few things on which they and Hylians could see eye to eye. To a Hylian, a cemetery was a place of death, but to a Sheikah, it was a place of memory. The Shadow Folk revered their fallen so much they built their temple within their graveyard.

Three of us, she thought. Two lunches, and a tomb. What did it mean? Because whatever it was, it was one of the only honest things Kakashi had said since she met him.

Naruto cut himself out of one rope trap, and immediately stepped into another. She had told him the day before that he had been placed on the same team as Sasuke for the sake of balance, but why place them on balanced teams if the weakest one was just going to fail? What am I not seeing?

After that, Naruto had asked her about the Triforce, the three that had been one that should never have been broken. Two lunches and a tomb.

And before, there was a moment of pity in Kakashi's eyes when ….

"I can do this by myself."

"Good thinking, Zelda!" Naruto said after freeing himself from the second trap. "If we eat now, he won't be able to eat in front of us later."

"No," Zelda said. "There's no time for that. We only have twenty minutes before the test ends."

He grimaced. "Do you really think we have a chance? I threw everything I had at him, and he was just playing with me."

"Yes," Zelda agreed. "He has been playing with us. And I think I just figured out his game. Can you send some shadow clones to find Sasuke?" It was, from what Zelda had read, a difficult technique, but Naruto had produced several to help him fight Kakashi.

"I guess, but what do we need him for?"

"He is part of this," she said. "Or none of us are."

"So it's a three player game?" He muttered something under his breath that sounded like "stupid jerk" and formed five copies of himself. "What should they do when they find him?"

"Disrupt themselves. That should transfer their memories back to you."

His eyes widened. "They can do that?"

"Of course. You're the only person I've heard of who uses them for combat. Uneiko the Uneyed, Fintaito the Seer, Tomoe the Wraith, they all used shadow clones for information gathering. The only well known exception was Mimomoro the Mad, who used them for training."

His eyes bulged even more. "You can use them for training? Do you mean like sparring with them, or what?"

"Nineteen minutes, Naruto. At the risk of being curt, I must ask you to focus on finding Sasuke."

"Okay, fine." The shadow clones darted off in different directions. "But don't think I'm going to forget what you said."

"I wouldn't dream of it," Zelda said. "You'll have all the time you need to train when this test is over."

"Right, the test," he said. "The test that is a game that needs Sasuke here for some reason, and–holy crap!"

Sasuke himself appeared from behind a tree as soon as his name was called, and he was bleeding. Knives and needles protruded from his flesh, dripping blood wherever he stepped. "Help me," he croaked, his voice barely more than a whisper.

"Hey, look!" Naruto said, pointing. "Sasuke's dying!"

The image, though, did not match up with the sound. Sasuke's words didn't match the movement of his lips, nor the the sound of his feet match his steps. These were subtle inaccuracies, but not one that a jounin like Kakashi should have made. If he were taking them seriously, at least.

"Naruto," Zelda said.

"Oh, sorry. I mean, oh no! Sasuke's dying!"

"That's not Sasuke," Zelda explained. "That's a genjutsu."

"Oh, right, a jengutsu. Yeah. That's … that's a school word, isn't it?"

"It's a hypnosis based illusion," Zelda explained. "It can be dispelled either through sudden, intense pain to shock you into lucidity, or through a burst of chakra, like so." She put her hands together to form a seal and focused her chakra. The illusion dissipated.

"Huh," Naruto said, looking at the spot where Sasuke's image had been. "I remember Iruka explaining that stuff, but he never used a repeatedly stabbed Uchiha as a prop, so it was hard for me to remember it."

"He's our teammate now," Zelda said, scanning the trees. If the illusion was there, then Kakashi would have to be nearby, right? "You'll have to get along–"

Naruto let out a scream. "Zelda!"

"What?" She turned to him, and saw him kneeling on the ground, fixated on an empty spot of dirt.

"It's okay!" he said, his voice growing frantic. "I know first aid! No, no I don't. But don't worry, I'm pretty sure you don't need those organs anyway. I'll go get help, so just stay here, and whatever you do, don't bleed out."

Another genjutsu. Did Kakashi know any other tricks? She smacked Naruto upside the head to break the spell.

"Ow!" He turned around and saw her. "You're alive!"

"Yes," she sighed. "I'm–"

"It's a miracle!" He threw his arms around her in a hug.

"Oof! Um, that's okay, you can stop." Zelda was many things, but she was not a hugger.

"I'm not crying, I swear!" he said into her shoulder.

Zelda patted him on the back, not sure what to do. In the academy, they were taught to be stoic, skeptical, and cynical, which Naruto had learned as well as he had learned genjutsu. Ninja in general were supposed to trust their minds over their eyes, but while Naruto had been blessed with a strong heart, the same couldn't be said for his mind.

"I'll watch for you," she said finally, "and you'll watch for me, and we'll get through this."

Naruto let go of her and smiled. "Yeah! Because we're a team!"

Zelda smiled, or at least the corners of her lips twitched. She had learned stoicism, and had it ingrained into her more than some of her teachers had hoped. "Exactly. And speaking of teams …"

"Oh, right, found him. Kakashi too. They were fighting each other." Naruto grinned. "Sasuke was losing."

"Then we should hurry up and help him."

"Oh, right. I guess that is the plan."

Zelda nodded. "Lead the way."

They took off at a sprint through the trees. Zelda changed into her Sheikah form, as it was better at running. Zelda had the same amount of chakra in either form, but chakra was the combination of physical and spiritual energy, so while as a Hylian she had more spiritual energy, as a Sheikah she was more physical.

When they finally reached their destination, Kakashi was long gone, and Sasuke was buried in the ground up to his neck.

"Hey look!" Naruto said, pointing. "Sasuke's a severed head!"

Zelda reverted to her Hylian form. "Naruto."

"Oh, sorry. I mean, oh no! Sasuke's a severed head!"

"Oh, great," Sasuke said, managing to look down at them despite not reaching their knees. "The cavalry has arrived. Kill me now."

"And it can talk."

"It?" Sasuke repeated.

Naruto turned to Zelda, ignoring him. "Okay, I know this is another one of them hypnollusions, but before you get rid of it, there's something that I've always wanted to do: use Sasuke's severed head as a soccer ball."

"Oh, you cannot be serious!"

"That's not an illusion," Zelda explained. "He's just partially buried."

"You mean it's real?" Naruto looked down at Sasuke in amazement.

Sasuke scowled. "Again with the it?"

"So hold on," Naruto said. "Does this mean that I can or can't kick him in the face?"

"It means that you need to dig him out."

"What?" Naruto protested. "But … but I might never get this chance again!"

Goddess, she did not have time for this! "You might never have the chance to become a ninja if we don't pass this test! So ask yourself what you want more: to become a ninja, or kick Sasuke in the face?"

Naruto gritted his teeth and closed his eyes for a moment. "I have never felt more conflicted about something than I have right now." He sighed. "But alright. I'll do it, but I won't like it." He formed three shadow clones, and all four of them started digging, using their knives as spades.

"Oh, wonderful," Sasuke said dryly. "I'm being assisted. Just when I thought being buried alive was the lowest I could go, teamwork happens."

"Sasuke, you are not helping."

"I don't intend to. I don't know how you managed to forget this, but we're in a competition right now."

"No," Zelda said firmly as Naruto continued to dig. "This is not a competition, this is a test. The test is to see if we can see through the trick that makes us think that this is a competition, and beyond the trick, the test is teamwork."

Sasuke, uncovered to the waist, pulled himself out the rest of the way. "What makes you say that?"

A dozen bits and pieces, scraps of hints and shades of clues. More than she had time to explain. "It's the only thing that makes sense."

"Weeding out the weakest link doesn't make sense to you?" Sasuke asked, brushing dirt off.

"Expecting a rookie genin to single handedly defeat a jounin doesn't make sense to me," Zelda said. "A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, but the weakest chain is stronger than individual links, and that is what we are if we can't work together."

Sasuke hesitated. "And if you're wrong?"

"Then you lose nothing. You've already proven that you can't obtain a bell on your own, and working together will only increase your chances. And if we get the bells and Kakashi still sends one of us back to the academy … he'll send me. You and Naruto will keep the bells, and I'll go without."

"What?" Naruto protested. "You can't leave me on a team with him for the rest of my life!"

"I'll make chunin in six months or die trying," Sasuke said. "But for once I agree with you. That doesn't appeal much to me either."

Zelda struggled to remain calm. "Look, do you want to be genin together, or academy students apart?"

Sasuke gave her a flat look. "I'm considering my options."

"There are no other options!" Zelda said.

He cocked his head. "You're wrong on that front, at least. How about this: if we get two bells, I'll keep one, and you'll keep one, and Naruto gets kicked off the team."

"What?" Naruto looked from him to her. "And you wonder why I wanted to kick him in the face!"

"No deal," Zelda said, eyeing Sasuke. "This is my idea, so if I'm wrong, I pay for it, and no one else."

Sasuke smiled, and Zelda saw bitterness in his eyes and cruelty on his lips. "But that's the thing about teamwork. When you're on a team and you lose, you're not always the one to pay for it. Sometimes it's everyone, and sometimes it's everyone else."

The concept revolted her … but he had a point. If she failed in her life's work, she wouldn't be able to sacrifice herself to free her people. If Ganondorf captured her or if she managed to evade him until the day she died, her people would remain his slaves.

"I accept."

"What?" Naruto said, sounding betrayed.

"Do you trust me?" Zelda demanded. "Because if I'm right, the bells don't matter."

Naruto furrowed his brow. "Alright. I trust you."

"Good," she said, "because we have ten minutes left."

WWW

It took five. Naruto swarmed him with clones, hiding Zelda and Sasuke who disguised themselves as two more orange clad extras. Zelda stayed in the back and watched for tricks, prepared to shout out, in code, what Kakashi was planning, and Sasuke managed to a convincing impression of Naruto's inept enthusiasm until he got close enough to swipe both bells.

Still, Zelda suspected that Kakashi was facing them with far less than his true abilities, because they had finally started playing by his rules.

"Good job, kids," Kakashi said when they were done. "You got the bells, and you have–let's see–five whole minutes to fight among yourselves."

"What?" Naruto said. "Aren't you just going to say, 'You all passed,' and move on?"

Kakashi chuckled. "How can I say that when the test isn't over yet? Good luck, though. If you need me, I'll be over here, reading my book."

Sasuke stared at the bells in his palm, still and silent for a moment.

"Sasuke," Zelda said. "What are you thinking?"

He didn't look up. "What do you think I'm thinking?"

"I think you're thinking that if you keep both bells, you can be on a team all by yourself."

Sasuke made a fist, enclosing them. "I am thinking that. And I find I can't avoid thinking that, and the more I think it, the more it appeals to me compared to what you offer. I am thinking that I can progress far quicker one on one with a jounin sensei than I can with the extra deadweight slowing me down."

"Deadweight?" Naruto repeated. "If it weren't for us, you'd still be the world's most conceited soccer ball!"

Sasuke turned to him. "If you knew how convincing your voice was, you'd shut up right now."

Zelda put a hand on Naruto's shoulder before their argument could devolve into a fistfight. "This still goes back to which one of us was right. If this test is a means of weeding out the weak, then by obtaining both bells you have proven yourself to be the strongest of us all. But if this is about teamwork, as I believe, then you, dear teammate, have just stabbed us in the back. What do you think will happen to you if you're wrong?"

Sasuke held her gaze for a full minute without moving, then he unclenched his fist and tossed her a bell. She handed it to Naruto.

"That's not what we agreed to," Sasuke said.

"I lied." Perhaps it was selfish of her. She doubted that a team of Sasuke and Naruto would fair well without her to be the voice of reason, but she needed Naruto to trust her and Sasuke to respect her. And, oddly enough, it worked. Naruto looked from the bell to her and grinned, and Sasuke smiled at her with … approval, of all things.

Kakashi looked up from his book. "You guys done?"

"We're done," Naruto said.

"You sure? How about you, Sasuke, how are you feeling? You feel good about this?"

He nodded.

"And you, Naruto. Are you done?"

"Yes, we're done already! Let's get a move on!"

"And you, Zelda, the one with the most reason to be unsatisfied with the results, are you done?"

She nodded. "Yes, Kakashi, I am satisfied with the outcome."

"Well, good," he said. "Because you all pass."

Naruto punched the air with both hands. "YES!"

"But Zelda still gets tied up to the loser post without lunch."

She blinked. "What?"

WWW

"So," Kakashi said, smiling. It was amazing how expressive a single eye could be. "I hope you all learned something."

"Teamwork is a necessary evil," Sasuke said.

"Partial credit. I'll expect more from you in the future. Anyone else?"

"You are an amazing cook!" Naruto said between mouthfuls of his lunch. "And you'll make a great wife someday."

"Thanks. I think. But seriously, I put a lot of work into making those, and I'm glad I didn't have to throw them away. Your turn, princess."

"You're a sore loser," Zelda said, still tied up.

Kakashi laughed. "You got that right. I've been planning that test for half my life, blending a tradition that goes back for at least forty years with my own unique twist, and then you happened. The whole point of a character test is to be the right person instead of knowing the right answer, which is completely ruined if you figure out the puzzle. Did Sasuke give you a bell because he valued teamwork, or did he just want to keep his bases covered? Would Naruto ever have stopped slamming his head against the proverbial brick wall in time to try something else?"

"Yes," Naruto said.

"We'll never know," Kakashi continued.

"I said yes."

"But anyway, you all managed to work together in the end, and if you keep it up, you'll be able to compensate for each other's weaknesses, because no one can handle this job alone." He gave Sasuke a pointed look.

Sasuke scowled back at him. "I said it was necessary."

"Well, everyone has to start somewhere. Anyway, welcome to Team Seven, you're all officially genin, and we'll start training tomorrow morning." He turned and walked away.

"Alright!" Naruto said. "Score one for Team Orphan! What time tomorrow?"

"Team what?" Sasuke asked.

Kakashi shrugged in response to Naruto's question. "Whenever I show up."

"Wait!" Zelda called. "Aren't you going to untie me before you leave?"

"That's what teamwork's for!" He disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

"Well," Sasuke said, walking off, "I've have enough nonsense for one day."

Zelda looked at her one remaining teammate finishing his lunch. "Naruto, would you mind untying me?"

Naruto put down the empty box and cocked his head at her. "What's that? You want me to tickle you to death?"

Zelda blinked. "What? No, that's not what I said at all. I want you to untie me."

He frowned. "Seems like an odd request to me, but if you say so, it's tickle time!"

"No! I mean it, Naruto! I'm serious, if you take one more step I'll–I'll–Din's Fire."

As a gift of magic from one of the Great Fairies, Din's Fire didn't require hand seals. A sphere of flame engulfed her. It didn't harm her, her hair, or even her clothes, but the ropes that bound her, the post she was tied to, and her teammate were all burnt to a crisp.

"Ow …"

In retrospect, she could have used Farore's Wind to escape without hurting anyone, but … she regretted nothing.

WWW

A/n So there was more of a delay than I expected. I got involved with a bunch of other projects, but when I came back to this one, it just flowed out, which was nice, because no one likes writer's block. I may have exaggerated some of their character traits for comedic and/or dramatic purposes, but in canon Kakashi did call them out for acting childish.

I'd like to thank Magery for editing this, and I'd like to thank all the people who have left reviews in the past to let me know what they thought of it and to encourage me to keep writing. Speaking of which, if you have the time to leave a few words to tell me what you liked, disliked, or just didn't understand, I'd really appreciate it.